The Cold-Case Christianity Podcast

What does it take to stand for Christ when your convictions become unpopular—and how can you tell whether you're defending your faith or simply defending your side? In this episode of the Cold Case Christianity Podcast, J. Warner Wallace welcomes Cissie Graham Lynch to discuss her new book, Stand Steady: Fearless Faith in a Compromising Culture. Moving beyond the usual cultural talking points, thi...

Why would the Gospel writers place women at the center of the Resurrection story if they were inventing the account? In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast, J. Warner Wallace investigates the historical significance of the women at the tomb through the lens of a cold-case homicide detective. Mary Magdalene and the other women were not merely late-arriving observers. The Gospel accou...

Was Pontius Pilate real? And if the Gospels accurately describe Pilate, his Roman authority, and the execution of Jesus, what does that tell us about the historical reliability of the Gospel accounts? In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast, J. Warner Wallace investigates Pontius Pilate the way a cold-case homicide detective would investigate a historical suspect. We examine the exte...

Prayer is often treated as a spiritual reflex — something we do before meals, during emergencies, or in public moments where religious language seems expected. But when we examine the biblical evidence, prayer is far more than a routine, performance, or attempt to give God information He does not already possess. In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast , J. Warner Wallace investigate...

Is penal substitution a later theological invention — or does the Gospel testimony itself reveal that Jesus died in the place of guilty people? In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast , J. Warner Wallace investigates the case from the Gospels alone. Rather than beginning with a finished theological system, we examine the narrative and teachings of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John to ask...

Were more of Jesus' twelve disciples connected than we realize? In Matthew 10:2–4, the Gospel writer does more than list the names of the apostles. He appears to arrange the Twelve in pairs. Peter and Andrew are brothers. James and John are brothers. But what about the other pairings? Were Philip and Bartholomew friends before they followed Jesus? Is Bartholomew the Nathanael described in John's G...

When Jesus was arrested, condemned, crucified, and buried, His most visible followers had scattered. Yet two unexpected men stepped forward to care for His body:  Joseph of Arimathea , a wealthy and respected member of the Jewish council, and  Nicodemus , the Pharisee who first came to Jesus under cover of night. But were these men truly saved? Were they genuine followers of Jesus Christ—or were t...

Jesus is repeatedly portrayed in the Gospels through the lens of Moses and the Exodus—but the comparison is easy to miss if you are reading quickly. In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast , J. Warner Wallace investigates the many ways Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John present Jesus as the new and greater Moses. Jesus is called out of Egypt, passes through water, enters the wilderness, f...

Did Mary remain a perpetual virgin after Jesus was born? Or does the cumulative evidence of the New Testament indicate that Mary and Joseph later had a normal marriage and additional children? In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast , J. Warner Wallace examines this important—but nonessential—Christian debate using the same kind of cumulative reasoning jurors use in criminal trials....

Who wrote the Epistle to the Hebrews? The author never identifies himself—yet the letter leaves behind a compelling trail of internal clues, manuscript evidence, and early-church testimony. 📜 In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast, J. Warner Wallace investigates one of the New Testament's greatest authorship mysteries. Was Hebrews written by Paul? Did Luke translate or compose the...

How did 27 specific books end up in your New Testament out of hundreds of early Christian writings—and how can you be confident the church didn't just invent the Bible? In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast , J. Warner Wallace applies his cold case detective experience to the canon of Scripture, tackling questions like: Who actually decided what's in your Bible—and on what basis? D...

What if one overlooked factor quietly shaped all of Christian history—and still shapes the way you see Jesus today? 🤔 In this episode of the Cold-Case Christianity Podcast, J. Warner Wallace explores the timing, culture, and communication realities that made biblical Christianity possible in the first century, and what we'd learn if Jesus came in our modern, digital age instead.  ⏳📱 You'll disc...

In this episode, J. Warner Wallace takes you into the forensic details of the Bible's sacrificial system to examine a stunning claim: when John the Baptist called Jesus "the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world," he was doing something that flatly breaks the Old Testament lamb pattern. Using the same cold-case, investigative approach he applied for years as a detective, J. Warner shows...

If Mark really preserves Peter's eyewitness testimony, what does that mean for the other Gospels—and for skeptical claims that the New Testament is late, legendary, and contradictory? In this follow‑up episode, we build on the case from Part 1 and argue that Mark is not only rooted in Peter's preaching, but is also likely the  earliest written Gospel  that Matthew and Luke used as a framework. You...

Was the Gospel of Mark built on real eyewitness testimony—or is it just another religious legend? In this episode, cold‑case detective and Christian apologist J. Warner Wallace (you) walks through the historical and forensic evidence that Mark's Gospel is rooted in the firsthand experiences of the apostle Peter. You'll discover why early Christian writers called Mark "Peter's interpreter," how Mar...

In this episode, cold-case detective and Christian apologist J. Warner Wallace reopens "the Judas file" and asks a blunt question: Was Judas ever truly saved, or was he an unsaved insider from the start? Drawing on a detective's methodology, J. Warner walks verse by verse through every major Judas passage, examines Judass remorse in Matthew 27, and weighs historic voices—from the Church Fathers to...

How do you investigate the "missing centuries" of the Shroud of Turin like a real cold-case detective? In this third episode on the Shroud of Turin, J. Warner Wallace walks through the most popular claims about pre‑Turin relics—sudariums, veils, and rival "shrouds"—and explains why none of them close the chain‑of‑custody gap needed to treat the Turin cloth as first‑century evidence for Jesus. For...

In this extended episode, cold-case detective and Christian apologist J. Warner Wallace investigates every one of Jesus' Sabbath miracles and controversies as if they were crime scenes on a case board. Instead of treating these passages as isolated "nice healings," J. Warner stacks them side by side—Capernaum, the withered hand, Bethesda, the bent woman, the man with dropsy, the man born blind—and...

Is Jesus really God, or did the church just make that up later? In this episode of Cold-Case Christianity, homicide detective and Christian apologist J. Warner Wallace works through the Gospel of John like a case file, pulling one key piece of evidence from each chapter (John 2–21) to test the viral claim, "Jesus never even said He was God." You'll see how titles, reactions, and "hidden in plain s...

In this episode, J. Warner Wallace joins  The Bill Arnold Show  to discuss how followers of Jesus can thoughtfully respond to the recent events in Minneapolis. Drawing on his background as a cold-case detective and Christian apologist, J. Warner explores how to separate facts from headlines, think biblically about justice, authority, and race, and model truth and hope in a culturally divided momen...

Is the Shroud of Turin a genuine relic of Jesus, a medieval hoax, or something else entirely? In this second episode on the Shroud of Turin, cold-case detective and Christian apologist J. Warner Wallace examines the shroud the way he would any piece of evidence in a homicide trial, focusing on chain of custody, historical silence, and what the earliest Christians actually relied on to make the cas...

Are our favorite superheroes just modern myths—or are they clues that we were made for something more? In this episode, cold-case detective and Christian apologist J. Warner Wallace takes you on a deep dive into the "theology of superheroes." Drawing from Marvel, DC, and other comic-book universes, J. Warner explores how the attributes we assign to our heroes—unlimited power, knowledge, justice, m...

Many Christians say, "Just preach the gospel—God will do the rest." But Scripture paints a richer picture: the gospel is the power of God for salvation, and God still calls us to reason, explain, and persuade. In this episode, J. Warner Wallace walks through key passages—from Romans and Proverbs to the book of Acts—to show how Jesus' first followers actually shared the message. You'll see why Pete...

In this conversation,  J. Warner Wallace  joins  Janelle Wood  from  Finding Something Real  to examine the  case for Christianity  through the lens of a  cold-case detective . Together they explore  evidence, doubt, and the reliability of the Gospels , offering practical help for anyone wrestling with whether  Christianity is really true . Watch more from  Finding Something Real with Janelle Wood...

In this episode, J. Warner Wallace — cold-case detective, Christian apologist, and author of  God's Crime Scene  — reacts to the most viral atheist claims circulating on TikTok right now and runs them through the same forensic framework he used to solve decades-old murders. The central question:  Can you account for all the evidence in the universe by staying inside the universe? Whether you're a...